Author

Ian Gough

Founder & CEO, TimeBeat

Ian Gough founded TimeBeat in 2017 after two decades building precision-timing infrastructure for tier-1 financial venues, defence networks and broadcasters. His background spans linuxptp deployment, IEEE 1588 architecture and the operational realities of running grandmaster fleets across regulated environments. Ian leads commercial strategy and product direction at TimeBeat and is a regular contributor to the OCP Time Appliance Project working group.

Expertise

Precision Time Protocol (IEEE 1588)Grandmaster clock architectureMiFID II / financial timestampingOpen Compute ProjectNetwork timing operations

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Articles

Written by Ian

pillar24 min

Building a Redundant Grandmaster Topology: A/B/C Timing Without the Rack Footprint

Why a single-grandmaster deployment is a DORA Article 11 problem, what A/B/C redundancy looks like in a single rack unit, and how the Open Time Appliance Shelf turns three independent Rubidium Black+ grandmasters — with independent GNSS antennas — into the default finance-venue topology for 2026 and beyond.

pillar13 min

What If a Clock Could Prove Its Own Past? A Thought Experiment in Cryptographic UTC Attestation

A speculative question, not a product pitch: imagine if every machine could hand anyone independently verifiable proof of what its clock was doing at any moment in history. Would it matter? Who would benefit, what might it cost us, and would the world actually be better for it? An exploration of the idea of cryptographic UTC attestation.

cluster12 min

How to Choose a PTP Grandmaster Clock: A Practical Buyer's Guide

A practical, vendor-neutral checklist for selecting a PTP grandmaster clock — what to specify, what to ignore, and the questions that separate a deployment that works from one that quietly fails.

cluster12 min

Private 5G Timing: Designing the Sync Fabric for Campus and Industrial Networks

Private 5G networks (campus, factory, port, mining) inherit the timing requirements of public 5G but operate under very different constraints. A practical guide to designing a sync fabric for private 5G that meets the time-error budget without operational overkill.

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